Contents

Hancock and Shorter perform 10 compositions on the album, including the Grammy Award-winning "Aung San Suu Kyi", named after the Burmese pro-democracyactivistof the same name, "Joanna's Theme" which originally was on Hancock's original soundtrack to the film Death Wish and "Diana", originally recorded for Shorter's album Native Dancer. It is Hancock's forty-first album and Shorter's twenty-first.

1.
Album
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Album, is a collection of audio recordings issued as a single item on CD, record, audio tape, or another medium. Albums of recorded music were developed in the early 20th century, first as books of individual 78rpm records, vinyl LPs are still issued, though in the 21st century album sales have mostly focused on compact disc and MP3 formats. The audio cassette was a format used from the late 1970s through to the 1990s alongside vinyl, an album may be recorded in a recording studio, in a concert venue, at home, in the field, or a mix of places. Recording may take a few hours to years to complete, usually in several takes with different parts recorded separately. Recordings that are done in one take without overdubbing are termed live, the majority of studio recordings contain an abundance of editing, sound effects, voice adjustments, etc. With modern recording technology, musicians can be recorded in separate rooms or at times while listening to the other parts using headphones. Album covers and liner notes are used, and sometimes additional information is provided, such as analysis of the recording, historically, the term album was applied to a collection of various items housed in a book format. In musical usage the word was used for collections of pieces of printed music from the early nineteenth century. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, the LP record, or 33 1⁄3 rpm microgroove vinyl record, is a gramophone record format introduced by Columbia Records in 1948. It was adopted by the industry as a standard format for the album. Apart from relatively minor refinements and the important later addition of stereophonic sound capability, the term album had been carried forward from the early nineteenth century when it had been used for collections of short pieces of music. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, as part of a trend of shifting sales in the music industry, some commenters have declared that the early 21st century experienced the death of the album. Sometimes shorter albums are referred to as mini-albums or EPs, Albums such as Tubular Bells, Amarok, Hergest Ridge by Mike Oldfield, and Yess Close to the Edge, include fewer than four tracks. There are no rules against artists such as Pinhead Gunpowder referring to their own releases under thirty minutes as albums. These are known as box sets, material is stored on an album in sections termed tracks, normally 11 or 12 tracks. A music track is a song or instrumental recording. The term is associated with popular music where separate tracks are known as album tracks. When vinyl records were the medium for audio recordings a track could be identified visually from the grooves

2.
Herbie Hancock
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Herbert Jeffrey Herbie Hancock is an American pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, composer and actor. He was one of the first jazz musicians to embrace synthesizers, Hancocks music is often melodic and accessible, he has had many songs cross over and achieved success among pop audiences. Hancocks best-known compositions include Cantaloupe Island, Watermelon Man, Maiden Voyage, Chameleon, and his 2007 tribute album River, The Joni Letters won the 2008 Grammy Award for Album of the Year, only the second jazz album ever to win the award, after Getz/Gilberto in 1965. Hancock was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Winnie Belle, a secretary, and Wayman Edward Hancock and his parents named him after the singer and actor Herb Jeffries. He attended the Hyde Park Academy, like many jazz pianists, Hancock started with a classical music education. He studied from age seven, and his talent was recognized early, through his teens, Hancock never had a jazz teacher, but developed his ear and sense of harmony. He was also influenced by records of the group the Hi-Los. He reported that. by the time I actually heard the Hi-Los, I started picking that stuff out, my ear was happening. I could hear stuff and thats when I really learned some much farther-out voicings – like the harmonies I used on Speak Like a Child – just being able to do that, I really got that from Clare Fischers arrangements for the Hi-Los. Clare Fischer was an influence on my harmonic concept. he and Bill Evans. You know, thats where it came from, in 1960, he heard Chris Anderson play just once, and begged him to accept him as a student. Hancock often mentions Anderson as his harmonic guru, Hancock left Grinnell College, moved to Chicago and began working with Donald Byrd and Coleman Hawkins, during which period he also took courses at Roosevelt University. Byrd was attending the Manhattan School of Music in New York at the time and suggested that Hancock study composition with Vittorio Giannini, the pianist quickly earned a reputation, and played subsequent sessions with Oliver Nelson and Phil Woods. He recorded his first solo album Takin Off for Blue Note Records in 1962, Watermelon Man was to provide Mongo Santamaría with a hit single, but more importantly for Hancock, Takin Off caught the attention of Miles Davis, who was at that time assembling a new band. Hancock was introduced to Davis by the young drummer Tony Williams, Hancock received considerable attention when, in May 1963, he joined Daviss Second Great Quintet. Davis personally sought out Hancock, whom he saw as one of the most promising talents in jazz, the rhythm section Davis organized was young but effective, comprising bassist Ron Carter, 17-year-old drummer Williams, and Hancock on piano. After George Coleman and Sam Rivers each took a turn at the saxophone spot and this quintet is often regarded as one of the finest jazz ensembles, and the rhythm section has been especially praised for its innovation and flexibility. The second great quintet was where Hancock found his own voice as a pianist, not only did he find new ways to use common chords, but he also popularized chords that had not previously been used in jazz

3.
Wayne Shorter
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Wayne Shorter is an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Many of Shorters compositions have become standards, and his output has earned worldwide recognition, critical praise. Shorter first came to prominence in the late 1950s as a member of. In the 1960s, he went on to join Miles Daviss Second Great Quintet and he has recorded over 20 albums as a bandleader. Shorter has won 10 Grammy Awards, the New York Times has described Shorter as probably jazzs greatest living small-group composer and a contender for greatest living improviser. In 2017, he was awarded the Polar Music Prize, Wayne Shorter was born in Newark, New Jersey, and attended Newark Arts High School, from which he graduated in 1952. He loved music, being encouraged by his father to take up the clarinet as a teenager, after graduating from New York University in 1956, Shorter spent two years in the U. S. Army, during which time he played briefly with Horace Silver. After his discharge, he played with Maynard Ferguson, in his youth Shorter had acquired the nickname Mr. Gone, which later became an album title for Weather Report. In 1959, Shorter joined Art Blakey and he stayed with Blakey for five years, and eventually became the bands musical director. When John Coltrane left Miles Davis band in 1960 to pursue his own group, Coltrane proposed Shorter as a replacement, Davis went with Sonny Stitt on tenor, followed by a revolving door of Hank Mobley, George Coleman, and Sam Rivers. In 1964 Davis persuaded Shorter to leave Blakey and join his quintet alongside Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and he composed extensively for Davis, on some albums, he provided half of the compositions. Hancock said of Shorters tenure in the group, The master writer to me, Wayne was one of the few people who brought music to Miles that didnt get changed. Davis said, Wayne is a real composer and he writes scores, write the parts for everybody just as he wants them to sound. Wayne also brought in a kind of curiosity about working with musical rules. If they didnt work, then he broke them, but with musical sense, he understood that freedom in music was the ability to know the rules in order to them to your own satisfaction. Shorter remained in Daviss band after the breakup of the quintet in 1968, playing on early jazz recordings including In a Silent Way. His last live dates and studio recordings with Davis were in 1970, until 1968, he played tenor saxophone exclusively. The final album on which he played tenor in the sequence of Davis albums was Filles de Kilimanjaro

4.
Piano
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The piano is an acoustic, stringed musical instrument invented around the year 1700, in which the strings are struck by hammers. It is played using a keyboard, which is a row of keys that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings. The word piano is a form of pianoforte, the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument. The first fortepianos in the 1700s had a sound and smaller dynamic range. An acoustic piano usually has a wooden case surrounding the soundboard and metal strings. Pressing one or more keys on the keyboard causes a padded hammer to strike the strings. The hammer rebounds from the strings, and the continue to vibrate at their resonant frequency. These vibrations are transmitted through a bridge to a soundboard that amplifies by more efficiently coupling the acoustic energy to the air, when the key is released, a damper stops the strings vibration, ending the sound. Notes can be sustained, even when the keys are released by the fingers and thumbs and this means that the piano can play 88 different pitches, going from the deepest bass range to the highest treble. The black keys are for the accidentals, which are needed to play in all twelve keys, more rarely, some pianos have additional keys. Most notes have three strings, except for the bass that graduates from one to two, the strings are sounded when keys are pressed or struck, and silenced by dampers when the hands are lifted from the keyboard. There are two types of piano, the grand piano and the upright piano. The grand piano is used for Classical solos, chamber music and art song and it is used in jazz. The upright piano, which is compact, is the most popular type, as they are a better size for use in private homes for domestic music-making. During the nineteenth century, music publishers produced many works in arrangements for piano, so that music lovers could play. The piano is widely employed in classical, jazz, traditional and popular music for solo and ensemble performances, accompaniment, with technological advances, amplified electric pianos, electronic pianos, and digital pianos have also been developed. The electric piano became an instrument in the 1960s and 1970s genres of jazz fusion, funk music. The piano was founded on earlier technological innovations in keyboard instruments, pipe organs have been used since Antiquity, and as such, the development of pipe organs enabled instrument builders to learn about creating keyboard mechanisms for sounding pitches

5.
Soprano saxophone
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The soprano saxophone is a higher-register variety of the saxophone, a woodwind instrument, invented in the 1840s. The soprano is the third smallest member of the saxophone family, a transposing instrument pitched in the key of B♭, modern soprano saxophones with a high F♯ key have a range from A♭3 to E6 and are therefore pitched one octave above the tenor saxophone. Some saxophones have additional keys, allowing them to play an additional F♯ and these extra keys are commonly found on more modern saxophones. Additionally, skilled players can make use of the altissimo register, there is also a soprano pitched in C, which is less common and until recently had not been made since around 1940. The soprano saxophone can be compared to the B♭ clarinet, although the clarinet can play a fourth lower and over a fifth higher. Professional players will use the technique of voicing to fix problems with intonation, due to its similarity in tone to the oboe, the soprano saxophone is sometimes used as a substitute for it. In addition to straight sopranos, there are also slightly and fully curved sopranos, the fully curved variety looks much like a small alto saxophone with a straighter crook. There is some debate over the effect of the straight and curved neck, with some believing that a curved neck on a soprano gives it a warmer. The soprano has all the keys of other models and some may have a top G key next to the F♯ key. Soprano saxophone mouthpieces are available in various designs, allowing players to tailor their tone as required, in 2001, François Louis created the aulochrome, a woodwind instrument made of two joined soprano saxophones, which can be played either in unison or in harmony. The soprano saxophone is used as a solo and chamber instrument in classical music. It is included in the quartet and plays a lead role. Many solo pieces have been written for it by such as Heitor Villa-Lobos, Alan Hovhaness, Jennifer Higdon, Takashi Yoshimatsu. As an orchestral instrument, it has used in several compositions. It was used by Richard Strauss in his Sinfonia Domestica, where included in the music are parts for four saxophones and it is also used in Maurice Ravels Bolero and has a featured solo directly following the tenor saxophones solo. Vincent dIndy includes a soprano in his opera Fervaal, greats of the jazz soprano sax include 1930s virtuoso Sidney Bechet, 1950s innovator Steve Lacy, and, beginning with his landmark 1960 album My Favorite Things, John Coltrane. Other notable soprano saxophonists include Jay Beckenstein, Dave Koz, Grover Washington, Jr. Ronnie Laws, and Nigerian Afrobeat multi-instrumentalist Fela Kuti

6.
Myanmar
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Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar and also known as Burma, is a sovereign state in South East Asia bordered by Bangladesh, India, China, Laos and Thailand. About one third of Myanmars total perimeter of 5,876 km, forms an uninterrupted coastline of 1,930 km along the Bay of Bengal, the countrys 2014 census revealed a much lower population than expected, with 51 million people recorded. Myanmar is 676,578 square kilometres in size and its capital city is Naypyidaw and its largest city and former capital city is Yangon. Early civilizations in Myanmar included the Tibeto-Burman-speaking Pyu city-states in Upper Burma, the Pagan Kingdom fell due to the Mongol invasions and several warring states emerged. In the 16th century, reunified by the Taungoo Dynasty, the country was for a period the largest empire in the history of Mainland Southeast Asia. The early 19th century Konbaung Dynasty ruled over an area included modern Myanmar and briefly controlled Manipur. The British invaded Myanmar after three Anglo-Burmese Wars in the 19th century and the became a British colony. Myanmar became an independent nation in 1948, initially as a nation and then, following a coup détat in 1962. For most of its independent years, the country has been engrossed in rampant ethnic strife, during this time, the United Nations and several other organisations have reported consistent and systematic human rights violations in the country. In 2011, the junta was officially dissolved following a 2010 general election. While former military leaders still wield enormous power in the country, there is, however, continuing criticism of the governments treatment of the Muslim Rohingya minority and its poor response to the religious clashes. In the landmark 2015 election, Aung San Suu Kyis party won a majority in both houses, Myanmar is a country rich in jade and gems, oil, natural gas and other mineral resources. In 2013, its GDP stood at US$56.7 billion, the income gap in Myanmar is among the widest in the world, as a large proportion of the economy is controlled by supporters of the former military government. As of 2016, according to the Human Development Index, Myanmar had a level of human development. The renaming remains a contested issue, many political and ethnic opposition groups and countries continue to use Burma because they do not recognise the legitimacy of the ruling military government or its authority to rename the country. The countrys official name is the Republic of the Union of Myanmar. Countries that do not officially recognise that name use the long form Union of Burma instead, in English, the country is popularly known as either Burma or Myanmar /ˈmjɑːnˌmɑːr/. Both these names are derived from the name of the majority Burmese Bamar ethnic group, Myanmar is considered to be the literary form of the name of the group, while Burma is derived from Bamar, the colloquial form of the groups name

7.
Democracy
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Democracy, in modern usage, is a system of government in which the citizens exercise power directly or elect representatives from among themselves to form a governing body, such as a parliament. Democracy is sometimes referred to as rule of the majority, Democracy was originally conceived in Classical Greece, where political representatives were chosen by a jury from amongst the male citizens, rich and poor. The English word dates to the 16th century, from the older Middle French, in the 5th century BC, to denote the political systems then existing in Greek city-states, notably Athens, the term is an antonym to aristocracy, meaning rule of an elite. While theoretically these definitions are in opposition, in practice the distinction has been blurred historically, the political system of Classical Athens, for example, granted democratic citizenship to free men and excluded slaves and women from political participation. In 1906, Finland became the first government to harald a more inclusive democracy at the national level. Democracy contrasts with forms of government where power is held by an individual, as in an absolute monarchy, or where power is held by a small number of individuals. Nevertheless, these oppositions, inherited from Greek philosophy, are now ambiguous because contemporary governments have mixed democratic, oligarchic, and monarchic elements. Karl Popper defined democracy in contrast to dictatorship or tyranny, thus focusing on opportunities for the people to control their leaders, No consensus exists on how to define democracy, but legal equality, political freedom and rule of law have been identified as important characteristics. These principles are reflected in all eligible citizens being equal before the law, other uses of democracy include that of direct democracy. In some countries, notably in the United Kingdom which originated the Westminster system, in the United States, separation of powers is often cited as a central attribute. In India, parliamentary sovereignty is subject to the Constitution of India which includes judicial review, though the term democracy is typically used in the context of a political state, the principles also are applicable to private organisations. Majority rule is listed as a characteristic of democracy. Hence, democracy allows for political minorities to be oppressed by the tyranny of the majority in the absence of legal protections of individual or group rights. An essential part of a representative democracy is competitive elections that are substantively and procedurally fair, i. e. just. It has also suggested that a basic feature of democracy is the capacity of all voters to participate freely and fully in the life of their society. While representative democracy is sometimes equated with the form of government. Many democracies are constitutional monarchies, such as the United Kingdom, the term democracy first appeared in ancient Greek political and philosophical thought in the city-state of Athens during classical antiquity. The word comes from demos, common people and kratos, strength, led by Cleisthenes, Athenians established what is generally held as the first democracy in 508–507 BC

8.
Activism
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Activism consists of efforts to promote, impede, or direct social, political, economic, and/or environmental reform or stasis with the desire to make improvements in society. One can also express activism through different forms of art, daily acts of protest such as not buying clothes from a certain clothing company because they exploit workers is another form of activism. One view holds that acknowledging privileges and oppressions on a daily basis ranks as a form of activism, research has begun to explore how activist groups use social media to facilitate civic engagement and collective action. The Online Etymology Dictionary records the English words activism and activist from 1920, Activists can function in roles as public officials, as in judicial activism. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. introduced the term judicial activism in a January 1946 Fortune magazine article titled The Supreme Court,1947, some activists try to persuade people to change their behavior directly, rather than to persuade governments to change or not to change laws. Other activists try to persuade people to remain the same, in an effort to counter change, the cooperative movement seeks to build new institutions which conform to cooperative principles, and generally does not lobby or protest politically. Activism is not always an action by Activists, every year more than 100 environmental activists are killed, in 2014116 environmental activists were assassinated, in 2015185 activists were killed around this planet. Since the 1990s, the Internet has been a tool used by activists for mobilization and communication of causes, specific platforms like MoveOn. org, founded in 1998, allow individuals to establish petitions and movements for social change. Protesters in Seattle in 1999 used email to organize protests against the WTO Ministerial Conference, throughout the 2000s, protesters continued to use social media platforms to generate interest. The power of Internet Activism came into a lens with the Arab Spring protests. They use different means to political persecution, such as Tor Browser. The activism industry consists of organizations and individuals engaged in activism, Activism is often done full-time, as part of an organizations core business. Many organizations in the industry are either non profit organizations or non-governmental organizations. Most activist organizations do not manufacture goods, the term activism industry has often been used to refer to outsourced fundraising operations. However, activist organizations engage in activities as well. Lobbying, or the influencing of decisions made by government, is another activist tactic, many groups, including law firms, have designated staff assigned specifically for lobbying purposes. In the United States, lobbying is regulated by the federal government, many government systems encourage public support of non-profit organizations by granting various forms of tax relief for donations to charitable organizations. Governments may attempt to deny these benefits to activists by restricting the political activity of tax-exempt organizations, randy Shaw, The Activists Handbook, A Primer for the 1990s and Beyond

9.
Aung San Suu Kyi
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Aung San Suu Kyi is a Burmese politician, diplomat, and author who is the First and incumbent State Counsellor and Leader of the National League for Democracy. The youngest daughter of Aung San, Father of the Nation of modern-day Myanmar, after graduating from the University of Delhi in 1964 and the University of Oxford in 1968, she worked at the United Nations for three years. She married Michael Aris in 1972, and gave birth to two children, Aung San Suu Kyi rose to prominence in the 1988 Uprisings, and became the General Secretary of the newly formed National League for Democracy. In the 1990 elections, NLD won 81% of the seats in Parliament and she had, however, already been detained under house arrest before the elections. She remained under house arrest for almost 15 of the 21 years from 1989 to 2010 and her party boycotted the 2010 elections, resulting in a decisive victory for the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party. Aung San Suu Kyi became a Pyithu Hluttaw MP while her party won 43 of the 45 vacant seats in the 2012 by-elections and she is an honorary citizen of many countries, including Canada, and was an honorary member of Nelson Mandelas Elders. The Burmese refer to her as Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw, literally meaning aunt, is not part of her name but is a Burmese honorific for any older and revered woman, akin to Madame. Burmese sometimes address her as Daw Suu or Amay Suu, Aung San Suu Kyi was born on 19 June 1945 in Rangoon, British Burma. According to Peter Popham, she was born in a village outside Rangoon called Hmway Saung. Her father, Aung San, founded the modern Burmese army and negotiated Burmas independence from the British Empire in 1947 and she grew up with her mother, Khin Kyi, and two brothers, Aung San Lin and Aung San Oo, in Rangoon. Aung San Lin died at the age of eight, when he drowned in a lake on the grounds of the house. Her elder brother emigrated to San Diego, California, becoming a United States citizen, after Aung San Lins death, the family moved to a house by Inya Lake where Aung San Suu Kyi met people of various backgrounds, political views and religions. She was educated in Methodist English High School for much of her childhood in Burma and she speaks four languages, Burmese, English, French and Japanese. Suu Kyis mother, Khin Kyi, gained prominence as a figure in the newly formed Burmese government. She was appointed Burmese ambassador to India and Nepal in 1960 and she studied in the Convent of Jesus and Mary School in New Delhi, and graduated from Lady Shri Ram College in New Delhi with a degree in politics in 1964. Suu Kyi continued her education at St Hughs College, Oxford, obtaining a B. A degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics in 1967, graduating with a third and M. A degree in politics in 1968. After graduating, she lived in New York City with family friend Ma Than E and she worked at the United Nations for three years, primarily on budget matters, writing daily to her future husband, Dr. Michael Aris. On 1 January 1972, Aung San Suu Kyi and Aris, the following year she gave birth to their first son, Alexander Aris, in London, their second son, Kim, was born in 1977

10.
Record producer
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A record producer or music producer oversees and manages the sound recording and production of a band or performers music, which may range from recording one song to recording a lengthy concept album. A producer has many roles during the recording process, the roles of a producer vary. The producer may perform these roles himself, or help select the engineer, the producer may also pay session musicians and engineers and ensure that the entire project is completed within the record companies budget. A record producer or music producer has a broad role in overseeing and managing the recording. Producers also often take on an entrepreneurial role, with responsibility for the budget, schedules, contracts. In the 2010s, the industry has two kinds of producers with different roles, executive producer and music producer. Executive producers oversee project finances while music producers oversee the process of recording songs or albums. In most cases the producer is also a competent arranger, composer. The producer will also liaise with the engineer who concentrates on the technical aspects of recording. Noted producer Phil Ek described his role as the person who creatively guides or directs the process of making a record, indeed, in Bollywood music, the designation actually is music director. The music producers job is to create, shape, and mold a piece of music, at the beginning of record industry, producer role was technically limited to record, in one shot, artists performing live. The role of producers changed progressively over the 1950s and 1960s due to technological developments, the development of multitrack recording caused a major change in the recording process. Before multitracking, all the elements of a song had to be performed simultaneously, all of these singers and musicians had to be assembled in a large studio and the performance had to be recorded. As well, for a song that used 20 instruments, it was no longer necessary to get all the players in the studio at the same time. Examples include the rock sound effects of the 1960s, e. g. playing back the sound of recorded instruments backwards or clanging the tape to produce unique sound effects. These new instruments were electric or electronic, and thus they used instrument amplifiers, new technologies like multitracking changed the goal of recording, A producer could blend together multiple takes and edit together different sections to create the desired sound. For example, in jazz fusion Bandleader-composer Miles Davis album Bitches Brew, producers like Phil Spector and George Martin were soon creating recordings that were, in practical terms, almost impossible to realise in live performance. Producers became creative figures in the studio, other examples of such engineers includes Joe Meek, Teo Macero, Brian Wilson, and Biddu

11.
Grammy Award
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A Grammy Award, or Grammy, is an honor awarded by The Recording Academy to recognize outstanding achievement in the mainly English-language music industry. The annual presentation ceremony features performances by prominent artists, and the presentation of awards that have a more popular interest. It shares recognition of the industry as that of the other performance awards such as the Emmy Awards, the Tony Awards. The first Grammy Awards ceremony was held on May 4,1959, to honor, following the 2011 ceremony, The Academy overhauled many Grammy Award categories for 2012. The 59th Grammy Awards, honoring the best achievements from October 2015 to September 2016, was held on February 12,2017, the Grammys had their origin in the Hollywood Walk of Fame project in the 1950s. The music executives decided to rectify this by creating a given by their industry similar to the Oscars. This was the beginning of the National Academy of Recording Arts, after it was decided to create such an award, there was still a question of what to call it, one working title was the Eddie, to honor the inventor of the phonograph, Thomas Edison. They finally settled on using the name of the invention of Emile Berliner, the gramophone, for the awards, the number of awards given grew and fluctuated over the years with categories added and removed, at one time reaching over 100. The second Grammy Awards, also held in 1959, was the first ceremony to be televised, the gold-plated trophies, each depicting a gilded gramophone, are made and assembled by hand by Billings Artworks in Ridgway, Colorado. In 1990 the original Grammy design was revamped, changing the traditional soft lead for a stronger alloy less prone to damage, Billings developed a zinc alloy named grammium, which is trademarked. The trophies with the name engraved on them are not available until after the award announcements. By February 2009,7,578 Grammy trophies had been awarded, the General Field are four awards which are not restricted by genre. Album of the Year is awarded to the performer and the team of a full album if other than the performer. Record of the Year is awarded to the performer and the team of a single song if other than the performer. Song of the Year is awarded to the writer/composer of a single song, Best New Artist is awarded to a promising breakthrough performer who releases, during the Eligibility Year, the first recording that establishes the public identity of that artist. The only two artists to win all four of these awards are Christopher Cross, who won all four in 1980, and Adele, who won the Best New Artist award in 2009 and the other three in 2012 and 2017. Other awards are given for performance and production in specific genres, as well as for other such as artwork. Special awards are given for longer-lasting contributions to the music industry, the many other Grammy trophies are presented in a pre-telecast Premiere Ceremony earlier in the afternoon before the Grammy Awards telecast

The piano is an acoustic, stringed musical instrument invented in Italy by Bartolomeo Cristofori around the year 1700 …

Image: Grand piano and upright piano

Grand piano by Louis Bas of Villeneuve-lès-Avignon, France, 1781. Earliest French grand piano known to survive; includes an inverted wrestplank and action derived from the work of Bartolomeo Cristofori (ca. 1700) with ornately decorated soundboard.